The challenge at
Dragons Dream Tag It On is entitled 'Self Propelled Flowers' and butterflies, flowers and some form of movement are the ingredients that must be included. The theme was inspired by a quote by R. H. Heinlein: 'Butterflies are self propelled flowers'.
I liked the sound of this challenge but it took me a while to work out how I was going to approach it. Then other things got in the way so I'm only entering in the final hours of the challenge.
For the aspect of self propelled flowers, I decided that mine would be using their initiative and hitching a lift. I suppose they are working on the premise of 'why do yourself, what others can do for you'!! Hope that makes sense!
Here's what I made and I'll explain where the ingredients for the challenge come in as we go through the pictures:
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| The finished tag which I hope gives a sense of movement from the cog stamping, the pink 'paths' , the butterflies flying along the paths and the flowers hitching a lift on their wires attached to their butterfly friends. |
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| All the butterflies were die cut, from kraft resist paper glued to grunge board. Water soluble wax crayons and a water brush were used to colour the butterflies followed by some walnut stain ink on the edges and a generous layer of rock candy crackle paint. |
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The tag was coloured using the same method as the butterflies. The pink path has some extra layers applied with distress inks and a stencil followed by the two step crackle technique - I didn't want to use rock candy on this larger area because I think the two step gives a better crackle. Some acrylic paint was rubbed into the cracks when it was dry.
In the gaps around the path, a cog stamp from Oxford Impressions was used to help create the feeling of flow and movement. Some watch parts were used as embellishments on various areas of the stamping. |
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| This photograph and the next two, show the text stamped onto card coloured with dylusion ink sprays. It's a Tim stamp from which I chose the relevant sections for my tag. |
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| As well as the next part of the quote, you can also see the punched flowers making their own way slowing along the path moved by the cogs. They're made from card coloured with dylusion ink sprays, distress inks and some tiny gems.You can see a close up of one of the watch parts used on the stamped cog images. |
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| The last section of the quote. |
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| This view of the tag gives a clear image of the smaller flowers 'hitching' a lift from the butterflies. The flowers are double sided and some wire was twisted together and glued between the two flowers and then attached to the butterflies. |
I had great fun making this tag although it did stretch the brain a little which is another reason why it's taken me so long to get it finished - it's not that I'm slow in making of course!
Hope you like it. If you do, please leave a comment as I read them all and will visit you in return.
